The Formula 1 (F1) season opener, the Bahrain Grand Prix, has officially been announced as the most-viewed race in the history of Sky Sports, the United Kingdom (UK) broadcaster has reported.

Using data from the Broadcasters Audience Research Board (BARB), Sky confirmed race audience viewership peaked at 2.23 million viewers, with the entire race averaging a viewership of 1.98 million.

This is the first time ever of Sky channels that the opening race of the F1 season has peaked at more than two million viewers.

Audience figures were significantly higher than last year’s event in Bahrain, which averaged 1.39 million viewers, whilst this year’s season opener beat last year’s equivalent in Austria, where 1.51 million viewers tuned in.

In the digital world, Sky’s stream of the race of the opening lap on its social media platforms scored a total of 17,400 views, of which 9,300 were live.

A total of 2.1 million went online to read stories published on Sky’s digital platforms the week of the race, with a quarter of a million following in the live blog section of the race’s coverage.

The latest figures further indicate F1 is managing to increase interest in the sport despite the difficulties of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The figures also show the interest in F1 may get to the Nielsen Sports predicted target of one billion people interested in the sport by April 2022.